4. Sapphire

Sapphire

Something rustles at the cave entrance.

My eyes snap open, and I grab my dagger, positioning myself between Zoey and whatever’s coming.

The frost ivy’s leaves chime as they part, and my heart rises to my throat, my fingers tightening around the dagger’s hilt.

Did the branch monster find us? The shadow monster? A dark angel? Or something worse?

As I stand there, bracing myself for anything, a massive white leopard emerges from the shadows.

Ghost.

Which means...

Riven steps through behind him, his silver eyes gleaming in the frost-light as they lock onto mine.

Relief floods through me, and all at once, I can breathe again.

“You’re alive.” His voice is neutral, betraying nothing of what he’s thinking as he places the large pack he’s carrying on the ground.

Ghost has a pack on his back, too.

“Barely,” I say, but despite my relief, I don’t lower my dagger. “What took you so long?”

His brow lifts slightly, but he doesn’t rise to my bait.

Instead, his eyes shift to Zoey.

“What happened?” he asks.

“You tell me.” I lower my weapon. Obviously, I’m not going to attack him, given that a few hours ago, I was begging a rock for him to come help me. “We were attacked when we crossed that ravine. Dark angels, branch monsters, shadow creatures. Take your pick.”

“I heard you through the stone while you were being attacked. I came as fast as I could,” he says. “I had some… obstacles on my way here.”

“I had some ‘obstacles,’ too.” I huff, glaring at him.

“You told the dark angel something before you killed it.” He steps closer, a hum of electricity filling the space between us. “That you didn’t know what you were.”

Crap.

I did say that. I was trying to communicate with Riven through the whisper stone while answering the dark angel’s questions, which means he heard everything I said during the exchange.

More than I wanted him to hear.

“The dark angel tried to kill you,” he continues. “Torture you. Make you reveal something that you claim is a mystery, even to you.”

“My projection magic,” I say quickly, scrambling for a way around the fact that the dark angel was talking about my air magic. “I used it near the dark angel. But I don’t know how I can do it. It’s not a fae ability. He didn’t know, either.”

“No,” he agrees. “It’s not.”

Panic rushes through me. I can only skirt around the truth for so long.

I have to change the subject. Quickly. Before he pushes for more.

“Zoey’s dying,” I repeat, tears welling up in my throat as I motion to her unconscious body. “Those ice dragons slashed her arm in the forest, and the dark angel flung her into a tree. The wound on her arm is bad. So is the bump on her head. She needs help, and I made that bandage for her, but I don’t know what else to do.”

His expression shifts, concern crossing his face as he walks to Zoey, kneels beside her, and presses his palm to her forehead.

“The fever’s bad,” he says. “So is the wound.”

I kneel on Zoey’s other side, looking Riven straight in the eyes.

Is it just me, or does it look like he actually cares?

“Can you help her?” I ask. “Make a healing potion or something?”

He’s quiet for a long moment, still examining her.

“Basic healing potions are simple to brew,” he finally says. “But those are for cuts before infection sets in, or a single fractured bone. This...” He gestures to the blood-soaked bandage on Zoey’s arm, and the angry bruise on her head. “Her skull is cracked, she has several shattered bones, she’s lost a lot of blood, and her wound has progressed to a whole-body infection. Given her state, the potion would have to be brewed by someone with extreme magical talent.”

My stomach drops. “But you can do it. Right?”

He has to be able to do it. He’s a fae prince. If anyone has extreme magical talent, it’s a prince. Especially one who came out here to brew potions that couldn’t be made in Winter Court territory.

Illegal potions, if I had to guess.

“It’ll take some time, but I know where to find the ingredients,” he says slowly. “However, one of them that might prove to be problematic.”

“Problematic how?” I ask, not liking the sound of that.

“It requires extreme magical talent to properly extract,” he says. “Talent that I don’t have.”

“No,” I say, since I won’t accept that. “Maybe we can improvise. I did it all the time at the Maple Pig. If we ran out of an ingredient and I needed to make someone a drink, I’d feel it out. I’d make it work anyway. And I’ve never had a dissatisfied customer. You even admitted the drink I made you was good, even though you don’t like pink drinks.”

“I never said I didn’t think it would be good,” he reminds me. “I asked if I seemed like the type of guy who orders pink drinks.”

“Right now, you seem like an arrogant winter prince who’s finally admitting a fault—at the worst time ever,” I say, motioning to Zoey again. “There has to be something you can do to help her.”

Pain flashes across his face, catching me off guard.

“It’s not that simple,” he says, quieter now, as if the weight of what he’s about to say stole some of his insufferable confidence.

“What do you mean?” I ask.

He doesn’t meet my gaze right away. Instead, his hand trails along the frost-coated floor, tracing absent patterns in the ice.

Finally, he exhales, a breath that sounds more like surrender than frustration.

“My mother was a potion-maker. She claimed to be the best in the Winter Court,” he says. “There was one potion she refused to give up on trying to make. She was missing an ingredient, but she thought she was talented enough to create it anyway.”

He pauses, and I give him space to continue, having a feeling where he’s going with this.

“She died because of it,” he says, and the words hang in the air, heavy and brittle.

“I’m sorry,” I tell him, not knowing what else to say.

Because that pain in his eyes—it’s grief. Deep, agonizing, soul crushing grief.

“She brought me to this cave so many times when I was young,” he continues, his silver eyes clouded as he thinks back on it. “She made me memorize recipes, ingredients, and techniques. She wanted me to be just like her. But I was never as skilled as she was. I could follow the instructions, but I didn’t have her instincts. I didn’t feel the magic like she did. But you…” He pauses, his eyes sharper now, staring at me in a way that makes it seem like he’s seeing straight into my soul.

“What about me?” My heart races faster, and I glance down at Zoey, unable to push down my anxiety at the thought of Riven putting her life in my hands.

“Those drinks you made at the Maple Pig weren’t just drinks,” he says. “They affected people. Changed their moods. Made them feel exactly what they needed to feel in that moment.”

I swallow, knowing he’s right.

I didn’t know it at the time, but at that bar, when I made those drinks, I was using magic.

Water magic.

Potion magic.

“I think that’s why Ghost led me there,” he continues. “He sensed your talent. Your magic. He wanted me to meet you, so he brought me to you.”

His gaze lingers on me, and something shifts in the air between us. It’s subtle, but undeniable. The weight of his grief and the situation’s tension fades away, leaving us alone in the cave.

His eyes flicker to my lips, and my breath catches in my throat.

“Maybe Ghost was right,” he murmurs. “Maybe you’re exactly who I needed to find.”

“Riven…” His name leaves my lips in a whisper, and he moves his hand to brush his fingers against mine, gazing down at me with a hunger in his eyes that I’d recognize anywhere.

I yank my arm back, glaring at him.

“Seriously?” I snap. “You’re trying to seduce me over my best friend’s dying body?”

“I can’t help it that you’re irresistible when you’re on your knees begging for my help.” He smirks, back to his aggravatingly cocky self, as if he hadn’t been pouring his soul out to me a minute earlier.

I glare at him again, heat rushing to my cheeks. “You’re unbelievable.”

“I’ve been told that before.” He shrugs, his smirk firmly in place. “Although, normally after certain… activities.”

“Yeah, well, this isn’t the time for your little games,” I snap again, gesturing to Zoey. “In case you forgot, she’s dying.”

His smirk fades, and his gaze softens. “I haven’t forgotten.”

“Good.” I cross my arms, unwilling to back down. “Because apparently, you’re terrible at making potions. And now you’re asking me—someone who’s never brewed anything more complicated than a hangover cure disguised as a margarita—to save her life.”

“You said you’ve never had a dissatisfied customer,” he points out. “I’m betting you won’t start now.”

I open my mouth to fire back, but the weight of what he’s asking crashes over me like a tsunami.

This isn’t about making a drink that will get someone through a bad day or help them forget about their ex for a night.

This is life or death.

Zoey’s life or death.

I glance down at my best friend. Her pale face is slick with sweat, her breaths shallow and uneven. Worse, her bandage is soaked through.

My chest tightens—possibly from the scent of her blood as much as the fear of what will happen to her if I can’t pull through—and I press my palms against my thighs, trying to ground myself.

“What if I can’t do it?” I ask, hating how vulnerable I sound. “What if I mess up, and she—” My throat closes around the rest of the sentence, refusing to let it out.

“You won’t.” Riven’s voice is firm, cutting through my spiraling thoughts like a blade.

“You don’t know that,” I say. “You said yourself that your mother thought she could do it, and she couldn’t. She was the best, and it still went wrong.”

Riven moves closer, his eyes locking onto mine in a way that makes my breath hitch. “You’re not my mother.”

I blink, caught off guard by the conviction in his tone.

“You don’t have her fear clouding your judgment,” he continues. “You don’t have her doubts or her baggage. You have instincts—you know how to feel your way through the unknown, and that’s what makes you different. That’s what makes you capable. That’s why fate—well, Ghost—led me to you.”

I swallow hard, his words sinking in despite the storm raging in my chest.

He believes this. He believes in me.

But can I believe in myself?

The silence stretches between us, heavy and charged. I’m hyperaware of how close he is, the way his presence fills the space between us.

“Did you come alone?” I ask swiftly, breaking the spell. “Did your knights follow you?”

Is this a trap?

His jaw tightens, and he moves away from me, running a hand through his midnight black hair.

“No,” he finally says. “My knights won’t be following us.”

The way he says it makes my blood run cold.

“What do you mean?” I ask.

“When I heard you through the stone, I ran to find you.” His voice is flat, emotionless. “But they followed me. Tracked me through the forest.”

“And?” I press, even though I’m not sure I want to hear the answer.

“There was only one way to stop them.” He clenches his jaw, pressing his lips together, not saying more.

Which tells me everything I need to know.

“You killed them,” I say the words he apparently can’t.

“I did what I had to do,” he says, stone cold. “I slew my own men for you. Which means the three of us—me, you, and Zoey—are fugitives from the Winter Court.”